Dubai: Russia's Malik ‘Smiler' Omarov stole the show with a TKO over England's Stuart Davies in the inaugural Dubai Fighting Championship at Al Habtoor Grand Hotel on Friday.
Twelve action packed fights including the heavyweight ex-UFC Champion Ricco ‘Suave' Rodriguez against Stav ‘Crazy Bear' Economou wowed the crowds, kicking off with the semi-professional bouts between Evan O'Reilly from Ireland and Shafeeq Iqbal from India.
Within two minutes and four seconds, O'Reilly half-mounted Iqbal into a keylock submission. The event further intensified as the matches moved on to the preliminary professional bouts as Brazilian fighter Nilson Lopes beat Iran's Morteza Minbashi with an arm-bar.
The swiftest round of the night was between Brazil's Fabricio Nascimento and Iran's Mohammad Naemi with Nascimento managing to side-mount Naemi with an arm-bar inside 52 seconds.
The co-main event with Muai-Thai fighter Omarov against Davies - stole the show. After what seemed like an endless back and forth slugfest, round three ended with Omarov winning by TKO due to Davies' injured knee.
In the main event, Stav Economou picked up a unanimous decision win over Ricco Rodriguez. Even though Economou appeared to be losing the first round to Rodriguez, he regained composure knocking Rodriguez to the ground and unleashing a flurry of head punches in the second.
Rodriguez failed to grab Economou's kick in round three, allowing Economou to ultimately wrestle Rodriguez to the floor, and continue to strike Rodriguez until the round had ended.
Organiser Tam Khan said: "There is so much room for growth. We feel this experience tonight will enable us to take it to the next level for future events. We already have planned a DFC ‘Fight Night' which is a show that concentrates on future DFC stars; fighters who are not yet professional but would want to display their skills on a smaller scale. The event is planned for June 8th at the Boracay Nightclub in the Asiana Hotel in Dubai."
"There were amazing displays of skill shown tonight by the fighters, from slick submissions to devastating striking. There were no losers in my opinion".
